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The first thing Johnathan Ivey wants people to know, is that he did not simulate a heart attack in his heavyweight title defense against Travis Fulton on Saturday in Kokomo, Ind.
"It's silly," Ivey told MMAjunkie. 19659002] As to what happened after that, when Ivey (41-57) left a Fulton shot, then ran out, costing himself the victory and the title? Well, he can explain it. First of all, though, you must understand Ivey's specific feelings about Fulton (256-54-10), which he calls a "hero" of his life.
"In 1998, when I debuted, it was on a HOOKnSHOOT card when it was a big problem," said Ivey. "I was on the # 39, undercard, and Travis Fulton was the main event that night. From then on, I always looked towards him. I tattooed it on my leg maybe 10 years ago. I was basing my career on his, how active he was, how he was always going to fight guys in their hometown. He was just that guy. He was a warrior for me. I could not win some of the fights he won. He was always a little better than me. I looked a little like the traitor Fulton of the poor, but it did not bother me.
So, to recap … Johnathan Ivey simulates a heart attack, gives up Travis Fulton, does a follow up with GNP … then decides that he can not hit his idol in the face anymore and shoot. #mmathings pic.twitter.com/grK54YhOe0
– caposa (@Grabaka_Hitman) July 1, 2018
So when the promoter of the Colosseum of Combat went through several potential adversaries For that title fight before finally settling on Fulton, Ivey was excited. Here's another chance to fight a personal idol – the one that had submitted it the first time that they fought in 2002. In addition, Ivey knew that Fulton would not pull out of the fight, since you do not win more than 300 record pro fights by failing to show up.
As the two big men mixed in the first round, Fulton kicked Ivey's ribs. The kick did not hurt him, Ivey said, but he landed with a resounding slam that had a reaction from the crowd.
"The crowd went" oooh! "Ivey said. "Then I acted as if it hurt me … I saw people saying that I was pretending to have a heart attack, or I did not respect it by doing it, but that was not good. Was not what I was doing … I like to have fun in there.I did stuff like that in 50 or 60 of my fights .I like to play for the crowd. "
With this piece of theater over, Ivey quickly bounced back and went to the attack, forcing Fulton against the cage and dropping it with a left hook. After following him on the carpet, Ivey let out a stream of left hands that, in his opinion, severely damaged Fulton.
"After the second, her eyes rolled in her head," Ivey said. "I turned to the referee and I told him," OK, he did it again. "The referee said," No, he is not. Keep fighting. "Then I changed it and threw some straight straight, thinking that he was fixing it. Then Travis comes back and he does not defend himself but he changes his hips. I moved and put my knee on his head, and then started throwing real light hands. He does not defend himself. He is defenseless. Then I say to the referee: "Come on, that's it." And the referee says, "Keep fighting."
Ivey had other plans.
"If it was a guy who had been really thrown at me, I would have continued to hit him," Ivey said. "But that was Travis Fulton," he said. L & # 39; & # 39 Ironman. So I hit him twice more, and I watched the referee like, do not force me to hit him. But the referee was categorical. So I got up and went back. The referee said, "What are you doing?" I told him that he did not want to stop it, I would do it.
As Fulton stood up, Ivey leaned over and patted the rug. At first, referee Gary Copeland did not seem to know what to do with it. But then Ivey made it clear that he was tapping. From the way he explained it, he preferred to take the defeat and give up his heavyweight title rather than continue to hit Fulton, who, according to him, had already suffered too much damage
"C & # 39; was a split second, "says Ivey. "I'm not going to stay there and hit Travis Fulton unnecessarily, I'd already hit him 15 or 20 times, and he was not rejecting anything." He was helpless. "
In a Facebook post after the event, Fulton challenged this account a bit.
"Ivey would have finished with me?" Fulton wrote on his Facebook page. "Would I have come back and won the fight on the second or third round?" After looking at the fight, I think one or the other was a possibility – it was not as if I was unconscious and the referee did not intervene so Ivey showed me pity and handed me the victory. "
Yet, Fulton admitted, he was definitely hurt at the time. While he remembered seeing Ivey typing, he wrote that he did not remember the post-fight interview nor leave the cage after the fight.
When Fulton heard Ivey explain that he just could not continue to hit his hero, a reflection on the part of Fulton. As he wrote in his post, it made him think of his own fighting hero, Dan Severn.
"I still have trouble accepting the fact that I'm the hero of another fighter," Fulton writes. "Do I want to beat my fighting hero Dan Severn?" "Absolutely, but I never thought about how I would feel when I was on the brink of victory." You know what I've got realized in the same scenario as last weekend … I could not (expletive) do it! It was an emotional shock that I had never thought of. "
Thinking about the fight also seems to have brought Fulton to another conclusion
"In my first 275 mma fights, I was only opened twice," wrote Fulton. "I've been dropped just three times and I've never been knocked out.In my last 30 fights, I've been cut 4 times, dropped several times and I've been eliminated. For the first time in my fighting career. "
After being dropped and almost finished by Ivey, Fulton wrote," The way this fight has been played has shown me that I've been in this world. it was time to hang them up. "
And so ends a career that lasted more than 20 years and more than 300 fights.
As for Ivey, he will fight, he said. People can criticize his online performance, and he heard a lot of screaming from the crowd as he was coming out of the arena Saturday night, but that did not bother him.
"I agree with my decision," Ivey told me. "It cost me the title, and it cost me the win, but it does not bother me, I've lost a lot of fights, obviously I still want to win, but that's not worth it." It does not matter if it means that I have to continue to hit my hero that way, they can have that title, and that does not bother me. "
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